Archive for September, 2011

On a particularly hot and humid Sunday as I was showing a few tourists around the Marolles area, we noticed this charming little cafe that I don’t remember seeing before. Since one of my friends was in caffeine withdrawal and I know Ethiopian coffee is powerful, we stopped in. The cafe is small but pretty, and sells a few Ethiopian fair trade goods. They make fair trade tea and coffee also. We were disappointed with the black tea which had a strange earthy taste. The coffee was not quite as strong as we had hoped, and no coffee making ceremony. I tried a Baobab juice drink, which was not particularly tasty, but certainly refreshing and apparently very good for me! The food looked good, and the cafe had cards for some of my favourite Ethiopian eateries (see other posts). I think it would be worth another try at a moment when we wanted to spend a little longer lounging! The toilets had interesting lights (that weren’t very bright, both of us were looking for the light switch as we went in, before realising the were already on!). Overall our experience was not the best, but not the worst cafe in the Marolles. So take that for what it’s worth 😉

I think I have mentioned how much I adore sushi. I also used to live in Leuven, a pretty student town just 20 mins outside Brussels North station. Worth a visit, if you’ve never been, and home to my favourite sushi resto in Belgium (so far!) A friend of mine finished her Phd this year and was celebrating her last weekend in Belgium by eating in a few of our favourite places, so this is the 3 person boat from Inari sushi in Leuven. The spicy tuna is amazing – lovely the sesame and coriander dressing. They deep fry (tempura) some of their sushi rolls, as well as doing a roll with tempura shrimp (ebi) inside. The salmon and tuna sashimis are to die for, and the other couple of (unidentified) sashimi were interesting. One was more smoky – the other had a strong flavour and texture that was not really to my taste, but some might like it. There was far too little ginger on the boat, but they provided a large bowl on request, and your green tea is topped up with hot water for free (ask earlier, as it gets strong near the bottom, if like us you are taking a while to demolish the contents of the whole boat!). The service is friendly, the price is very reasonable for the great sushi on offer, and there is a good selection of non-fish dishes for the non-sushi lovers in your group (why, oh why though !)…

Reservation is a good idea. Promise to get back to Brussels cafes and restos soon, but in the mean time ‘Itatakimas!’